Offshore Leaks Database Reading List

Data Sources

Details on the three leaks that populate this database

The ICIJ Offshore Database shows relationships and networks among people or companies and offshore entities. Consider this database like a corporate registry where you can check information about a company and the people who played a role in that entity at a certain point in time. Roles include being a director, a shareholder, a beneficial owner, a trustee, among others.

The sources of this database are three massive leaks received by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The largest one comes from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, one of the world’s top creators of hard-to-trace companies, trusts and foundations, whose inner workings were exposed in the April 2016 Panama Papers investigation. The data was originally obtained from an anonymous source by reporters at the German newspaper Süeddeustche Zeitung, who asked ICIJ to organize a global reporting collaboration to analyze the files.

The Panama Papers data published in this interactive website are records from Mossack Fonseca’s internal client database, including companies incorporated in tax havens and the people behind them. This is just a fraction of the complete leak, which amounts to 2.6 TB and 11.5 million files. This database doesn’t divulge raw documents or personal information en masse. It contains a great deal of information about company owners, proxies and intermediaries in secrecy jurisdictions, but it doesn’t disclose bank accounts, email exchanges and financial transactions contained in the documents.

The third source of this database comes from a leak of the corporate registry of the Bahamas. From the 1.3 million files received as part of the Bahamas Leaks investigation, the database was expanded to include the names of directors and some owners of more than 175,000 Bahamian companies, trusts and foundations.

About this database

This ICIJ database contains information on almost 500,000 offshore entities that are part of the Panama Papers, the Offshore Leaks and the Bahamas Leaks investigations. The data covers nearly 40 years up to early 2016 and links to people and companies in more than 200 countries and territories.

Disclaimer

There are legitimate uses for offshore companies and trusts. We do not intend to suggest or imply that any persons, companies or other entities included in the ICIJ Offshore Leaks Database have broken the law or otherwise acted improperly. Many people and entities have the same or similar names. We suggest you confirm the identities of any individuals or entities located in the database based on addresses or other identifiable information. If you find an error in the database please get in touch with us.

Please read the statement below before searching

There are legitimate uses for offshore companies and trusts. We do not intend to suggest or imply that any persons, companies or other entities included in the ICIJ Offshore Leaks Database have broken the law or otherwise acted improperly. Many people and entities have the same or similar names. We suggest you confirm the identities of any individuals or entities located in the database based on addresses or other identifiable information. If you find an error in the database please get in touch with us.

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